Christ ife^an God 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

Chap, Copyright No. 

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



CHRIST 

THE MAN GOD 
OUR REDEEMER. 

BY 
Rev. J. F. X. 0>Conor, S. J. 









ST. LOUIS, MO. 190O. 
Published by B. HERDER, 

17 South Broadway. 



) 



33880 



.OS 



Library of Conpp«se 
Two CoPifS ^U^t^xEO 

AUG 13 1900 

Copyright entry 
No/?,./ 



SECr-T- copy. 
NIHIL OBvSTAT. LAUG-22-)9JQQ_J 

Sti Ludovici, die 1. Februarii 1900. 

F. G. HOLWECK, 

Censor Librorum. 



IMPRIMATUR. 

Sti Ludovici, die 3. Februarii 1900. 

Hh JOANNES JOSEPH KAIN, 

Archiep. Sti lyudovici. 



-BECKTOLD- 

f-RINTING AND BOOK MFG. CO. 
ST. LOUIS. MO. 



Copyright, 1900, by Joseph Gummersbach. 



PREFACE. 

The idea of Christ the Man God is one that 
appeals to every Christian. There are some who 
have never had placed before them briefly the 
whole character of the Divine Being who is at 
the same time God, in all the fullness of the 
Divinity, and Man, in all the perfection of 
human nature. 

Outside of the Catholic Church are many 
who have but an indefinite idea of Christ Our 
Lord. They speak of Him as a good man, a 
holy man, a benefactor of the human race, a 
type of glorious manhood, but they fail to 
acknowledge Him as Divine. 

If He is not God He is not even good, for 
He claimed that He was God. "Aut Deus 
aut mahis". 

These pages present Him as He is known 
to be by Catholic Tradition, Catholic teaching 
and Theology. These thoughts taken from 
dogma and devotion, have brought the reality 
of Our Lord's All Beautiful Divine character 
vividly and clearly to many minds. 

It is in the hope that our merciful Redeemer, 
Lord and Friend may be better known and 
loved, that these pages are sent forth to the 
hearts that may give Him a loving welcome. 

The: Author. 

SL Francis Xavier's CollegCy 
Easter igoo. 

(3) 



CONTENTS. 



I. Christ in Prophecy . . . 

II. Christ ill History . . . 

III. Christ the Man God . . 

IV. Christ in the Modern World 
V. Christ in the Christian Soul 



7 
25 
41 
59 
74 



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CHRIST THE MAN GOD OUR REDEEMER. 

I. CHRIST IN PROPHECY. 

This is Eternal Life, to know God 
and Him whom He has sent, Jesus 
Christ. 

To know Jesus Christ practically is our sal- 
vation. The Gospel is Jesus Christ, and to 
preach Him is to preach the law completed. 
He is the commentary of the Sacred Books. 
St. Augustine says, "if in them there is any- 
thing that does not refer to Him, we do not 
understand them aright". Eternal life begins 
by knowing the true God, and Him whom He 
sent — Christ. By Him we know God and 
through Him we understand God. Hence the 
world of heresy tries to obscure Him as it 
holds no definite teaching regarding Him. 
The Church teaches Him clearly, explains and 
unfolds His divine human nature, defines the 
elements of the theandric composition, that 
is — how He is God and man — making per- 
fectly clear and intelligible all the phases of 
His divine character. 

(7) 



8 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

The Liturgy of the Church is full of Christ. 
In the joyous time of Christmas she sings of 
His birth ; in Lent she remembers His fasting, 
her sad songs and mourning commemorate 
His death, and her glad alleluias at Easter 

— His resurrection. 

She symbolizes His glorious life, and His 
mystical life in souls. — She has, for the centre 
to which she constantly directs our gaze, the 
altar, where He dwells enthroned in His 
Eucharistic Life. 

To know our divine Lord well, is to know 
the Trinity — man, his fall, the Incarnation — 
Grace — Redemption — the Sacraments — the 
Church. There is no Church but the Church 
of Christ, there is no Church of Christ but 
the Catholic Church, for she alone can tell 
us who Christ is, and what Christ has 
done, and what He would have us do. — 
Go to any other church and ask it to tell 
you, by an agreement of its doctors, — if 
it have any who have the right to teach, 

— by the consent of its rulers — if it 
accept any authority, — who Christ is — and a 
clear definite answer you will receive from no 
other except from the Catholic Church, the 
Church of Christ. 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 9 

Many are being lost now, who would be 
saved, if tliey had but a clear idea of Jesus 
Christ. They would be able to say He, is my 
religion — in Him, my religion becomes a 
reality — because loveable, religion, made man, 
is Christ my Lord. To bring us nearer to 
our Lord, to bring Him nearer to us, is the 
object of these considerations. 

To bring to us this knowledge of Christ our 
Lord, we must establish a rational motive of 
belief, the reality of revelation. 

We begin with the Old Testament, as at 
least a faithful narrative — which gives us the 
figurative preparation — the promise, and the 
expectation of one whom God should send — 
He is the Messiah — the Christ of Prophecy. 

We shall consider Christ first, as foretold by 
the Prophets. From the beginning of the 
world, from that first prophecy in the Garden of 
Paradise we shall look forward to Him, follow- 
ing Him step by step until those last prophe- 
cies which specified both the time, and place, 
of His coming. Then in another discourse, 
we shall look backward through the vista of 
history, and behold how His life was recorded 
by His actions when He was living among 
men, and finally revelation will teach us that 



10 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 

tlie Christ of Prophecy, and of History, is the 
only Son of the living God, who became man 
to redeem the human race. 

We recall from remembrance, that after 
man's fall from grace by sin, God promised a 
repairer of the fallen human race. This 
promise was fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth. 

There are men who have dared to assert 
that no Messiah was ever promised, or that 
the one called the Messiah was merely a great 
man, and would free the Jews from slavery, 
or that the hope of a Messiah was a vain de- 
lusion usual with every oppressed nation. 

But we take the Scripture as a historical 
document, sincere and true, and we shall 
show that by its testimony, confirmed by the 
traditions of all peoples, God promised a re- 
storer of the human race, who is the Messiah 
of Prophecy. This Messiah, is the Christ of 
history, and this Christ is the man God the 
Saviour of the world. The Messiah means the 
anointed of the Lord. High priests, kings 
and prophets were anointed, and hence the 
anointed^ has a special meaning, of appoint- 
ment for a special work. 

In the long line of prophecies relating to 
Christ the Messiah, the first was made in the 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer, ii 

Garden of Paradise when God said to the 
serpent *'I will put enmity between thee and 
the woman, and thy seed and her seed, she 
shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in 
wait for her heel". i 

God promises to place enmity between the 
devil and woman, between the children of 
woman and satan — and that a descendant of 
woman shall crush his head. This means 
that the captivity and friendship of the devil, 
into which the human race had fallen by sin 
will be broken. In other words it promises 
the restoration of the human race from its fall. 
Later on, as the ages rolled by, this first 
prophecy became more definite. God promised 
Abraham that in him should be blessed all the 
nations of the earth. This was a spiritual 
blessing, for it was for all men, but a spiritual 
blessing was already promised to all men and 
hence should proceed from Abraham. 

Now, when we look over the traditions of 
other nations, we find that this first promise 
made to the first man and woman has been 
preserved, although more or less distorted in 
the history of other nations. In all these 
traditions, we hear of a demon who is master, 
and is to be conquered — and the conqueror 
is from the seed of woman. 



12 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

It appears under the figure of a dragon or 
serpent, the monster's head is crushed and the 
time of the victory is at the end of the iron 
age. Now there is a general principle that 
unity of form, in traditions of different nations 
and times, can be explained only by unity of 
source ; hence all these different traditions 
point out the unity of origin. In other words, 
these various traditions are taken from the 
promise made to the human race in the Garden 
of Paradise. 

Such unity in these traditions shows them 
to be founded on truth, which can be no other 
than the primitive promise of God, and al- 
though enveloped in fable, this teaches only 
the form and not the substance of the tradi- 
tion. Thus among the Persians the evil 
demon is Haman who is expelled from heaven 
by the good spirits and falls to earth as a 
serpent. A Messiah is promised, and Zo- 
roaster is born miraculously of his mother. 

In the Indian legends — Vischnu is the son 
of an innocent virgin ; and Vischnu in one of 
his incarnations, Krischna, crushes the head 
of the serpent; unity of language, unity of 
tradition, unity in the source. Among the 
Egyptians, Horns the son of Isis, the first 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 13 

woman, binds and kills Pytho, the serpent. 
Among the Greeks lo is a virgin whose son 
is Epaphus who will free Prometheus. The 
Latins tell of the virgin and the Golden age. 

The unity of these traditions points to one 
single origin, the primitive revelation of the 
coming of a deliverer, who would free man 
from the power of his enemy the serpent — 
the demon of evil. 

The Messiah is the end of the tvhoJe Old 
Testament. All the prophets from Samuel 
onward announced those days of Christ. The 
Old Testament was called the law, and St. 
Paul said the end of the law was Christ. 

The first prophecy extended to Abraham 
the Patriarchal period — 1920 — Abraham, 
Isaac, Jacob. Then came the other prophecies 
which are : The Mosaic, to 11 20 — ''I will 
raise a prophet like Thee". The prophecies 
of David, to 1050 — II. Psalm. — Messianic and 
those of the Two Captivities 800 B. C, those, 
after the captivity — 520 — before Christ. 

After the earlier prophecies comes that of the 
prophet Isaias — who prophesys about the per- 
son, the work and the kingdom of the Mes- 
siah. ''A virgin shall conceive and bear a 
son." The prophets say He will proceed 



14 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

from Jesse or David, that lie will be bom in 
Bethlehem, of a virgin Mother— the light of 
nations shall be Galilee. — He shall be God 
and man. Malachy and Aggaeus predict the 
time — the Messiah will come before the 
destruction of the second temple — the Temple 
of Solomon was destroyed. Jacob prophesy s : 
He will come when Juda has lost its autonomy, 
and Daniel foretells that He will come and die 
after the seventy-two weeks. *' From the going 
forth of the word to build up Jerusalem again 
unto Christ the prince there shall be seven 
weeks" — "after sixty-two weeks Christ shall 
be slain." These are weeks of years. 

The second temple will be glorious more 
than the first because in it Christ shall enter. 
And yet how great the glory of the first temple. 

*'A11 was covered with boards of cedar, and 
no stone could be seen in the wall at all." 
And "Solomon made the oracle in the midst 
of the house in the inner part to set there 
the Ark of the Covenant of the I^ord. Now 
the oracle was twenty cubits in length and 
twenty cubits in height and twenty cubits in 
breadth, and he covered and overlaid it with 
most pure gold; and the altar also he covered 
with cedar; and the house before the oracle 



Christ the Man God Our Hedeemer. 15 

he overlaid with most pure gold, and fastened 
on the plates with nails of gold. And there 
was nothing in the temple that was not cov- 
ered with gold, the whole altar of the oracle 
he covered also with gold. 

''And he made in the oracle two cherubim 
of olive-tree of ten cubits in height, and he 
overlaid the cherubim with gold — and the 
floor of the house he also overlaid with gold, 
within and without. And in the eleventh 
year, in the month of Bui, which is the eighth 
month the house was finished in all the works 
thereof, and he was seven years in building it. 
In the Sanctuary he put doors of cedar and 
overlaid them with a great deal of gold that 
had sculptures on it.'* 

Christ was to enter the second temple and 
by His coming render it more glorious than 
the first temple — richer than all the treasures 
of the nations. And what was this first 
temple. Behold its glory painted for us on 
the sacred page with additional splendor. 

Solomon began to build the temple in the 
fourth year of his reign, three thousand one 
hundred and two years from Adam. "He 
chose out of all Israel, and the levy was of 
thirty thousand men. He laid very deep in 



1 6 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 

the ground the foundation of the temple and 
built it up sixty cubits of white stone, and 
above another, so that it rose 120 cubits. In 
the temple were thirty rooms twenty cubits 
in height, above them were other rooms and 
others above them equal in measures and 
number. The roof over the house was of 
cedar, and each room had a roof of its own. 
Upon the roof were nailed plates of gold and 
as he enclosed the walls with boards of cedar 
so he fixed to them plates of gold which had 
sculptures on them, so that the whole temple 
shone and dazzled the eyes of all that entered 
by the splendor of the gold that was around 
about them. In it he also had veils of blue 
and purple and scarlet and the brightest and 
softest linen with the most curious flowers 
wrought upon them which were to be drawn 
before these doors; and to say all in one word, 
he left no part of the temple either the interior 
or exterior that was not covered with gold.'* 
"And it came to pass, when the priests 
were come out of the sanctuary that a cloud 
filled the house of the lyord. And the priests 
could not stand to minister because of the 
cloud, for the glory of the L^ord had filled the 
house of the L,ord.'' 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer, 17 

Now the prophets foretell the entering of 
Christ into the second temple, making it more 
glorions by His divine presence even than 
that splendor of Solomon. There in the first 
temple the glory of the Lord was manifested 
by the presence of a cloud — in the second 
temple by the living majesty of Christ. Jacob 
prophesys the time when the kingdom of 
Juda shall have lost its autonomy under the 
rule of strangers, and Daniel that He will die 
after sixty- two weeks of years. 

As a great painting in its beginning is first 
outlined and gives but a faint idea of its 
future perfect beauty, but gradually, by new 
touches the outlines are filled in and the pic- 
ture assumes more definite shape, until finally, 
it stands upon the canvas in all the glowing 
beauty of finished form and living color, so 
the image of the Messiah is brought first from 
the merest outline and gradually filled in by 
succeeding prophets until at last the reality 
stands before our eyes. In the judgment in 
Paradise there is the promise of enmity with 
Satan, and what greater blessing could be 
promised than enmity with the devil. There 
is promised to the seed of woman continual 
war against the devil and spiritual wicked- 



1 8 Christ the Man God Oar Eedeemer. 

ness, and this begins not by a human fact, 
but a divine one, for God says : '*I shall place 
enmit)'". That blessing is to pass to the 
race of Sem, Japhet and Cham. God chose 
from the Chaldeans Abraham of the race of 
Sem and between him and his descendants 
was to be the covenant with God. And this 
family grew into twelve tribes, the dying 
Jacob points out the particular tribe and how 
the divine blessing will be completed in one 
Saviour that is the Messiah. 

Baalam, the Gentile, will behold this one 
ascending from the tribe of Jacob like a star 
towards heaven, and Moses dying will fore- 
tell a prophet of which he is a type, who 
would know God and whose work would be like 
his own, and that prophet is no other than the 
Messiah. 

David speaks of Him as his son, and at the 
same time as the Son of God, who will be 
King and heir to the throne, so that His king- 
dom will not be Judea alone, but will em- 
brace the whole world. He will be the 
glory and the abjection of the people — He 
will die, and in His death and burial, will be 
triumphant and make all nations sharers of 
His triumph. The ]\Iessiah, therefore, is pro- 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 19 

pliet and king, containing in Himself the 
mystery of the cross and trinmph, the new 
priest not of Judea, but according to the Order 
of Melchisedech — offering not victories, but 
the sacrifice of bread and wine. 

The IMessiah is to be born in Bethlehem of 
Juda, of a virgin in lier conception and birth, 
that it may be a great and divine sign to a 
people oppressed by terror. When He is born 
the Spirit of God, the Spirit of wisdom will 
rest upon Him, the wise kings of the Nations 
of Arabia and Saba will bring Him gifts — 
when He enters Jerusalem as King, the daugh- 
ter of Sion and Jerusalem will be told to 
rejoice because "your King, the just One has 
come, poor, and seated upon the colt of an 
ass." His angel precursor St. John the Bap- 
tist will precede Him and He will enter the 
second temple giving it greater glory than all 
the treasures of the nations. The time is 
named when He will come when the family of 
David will be obscure and in poverty. He will 
take tbe sceptre of His Father's hand, when 
Juda shall have lost the sceptre of the tribes. 
The year of His death is made known, the 
destruction of the temple of Jerusalem and the 
everlasting desolation of the infidels. 



20 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

These records of the prophecies have a 
telling force, for they have been kej^t by the 
Jews — the enemies of the Christians — and as 
they could not be in favor, their authority is 
so much the more convincing. 

The foregoing prophecies were of the Mes- 
siah to come. — But these prophecies were 
fulfilled in Christ only. — Therefore Christ 
is this Messiah who was prophesied and 
promised. 

The time of the coming of the Messiah was 
so definitely indicated, that it can be known, 
now, whether that time has passed by or not. 
The Jews are still watching for that time like 
a man who has slept on a mountain — wakes 
and looks for the sun which has risen and set. 

The promise was given to the whole human 
race — the Jews could not prevent what was 
thus promised for all men, even had they 
wished. This time has passed by, for the 
Messiah was to visit the second temple, and 
either He did not come or this prophecy was 
not fulfilled, or He came long ago. But this 
was a true and absolute prophecy, therefore He 
has come. — It was at a time when the 
Romans were masters, and Juda had lost its 
autonomy. 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 21 

These different prophecies, so far apart in 
place and time, could have no other origin 
but God, since all so aptly fit the Messiah 
Christ. 

The example of a statue may explain the 
unity of the prophecies. If a sculptor makes 
a statue and sends head, hands, feet into 
different countries, he can collect them and 
put them together ; but if each part were 
made by different sculptors in different parts 
of the world and in different centuries, so that 
no one of the sculptors could not be directed 
in the work by another, if then all these parts 
being collected — agreed perfectly — in the 
least detail, so as to form one perfect statue, it 
would be a miracle. The one who made the 
parts would have to know the statue to which 
they belonged. So each single prophecy — 
in different places — centuries, coincides per- 
fectly in the person and life of Christ. For 
more than one thousand five hundred years 
the Prophets labored to picture this image of 
Christ. 

It was of a future one that the prophecies 
were to be verified, — and they were perfectly 
verified in Christ. The Old Testament was a 
preparation — it was the plan of the temple 



22 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 

— but it disappears when the temple is built, 
it was thie scaffolding, but the scaffolding is 
taken down when the house is finished. 

The Redeemer of the human race was 
announced of old, not only by prophecies — 
but by the striking events in the lives of great 
men. This method for foretelling which con- 
sists in deeds rather than in words was called 
a figure. 

Christ is called Adam, Adam gave life to 
the world — Christ to the Church. The blood 
of Abel called for vengeance — that of Christ 
for mercy. As Noah saved the world by 
w^ater, so Christ by the waters of baptism 
regenerates us. Melchisedech offered the 
bread and wine, a figure of the sacrifice of 
the Mass where Christ is the High Priest. 

Isaac was offered in sacrifice of obedience 
by his father, and so Christ. Joseph was im- 
prisoned, and was the deliverer of his brother, 
Job in his patience, Moses as liberator of his 
people, Joshua giving his people the promised 
land, Samson conquering all his enemies at 
his death, David as a shepherd ascending the 
throne, Solomon in his peaceful and glorious 
reign, Jonas three days in the belly of the 
whale — all these represent the events in the 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 23 

life of Him who was to come as king of the 
living and the dead. . 

Not only the great men of the ancient taber- 
nacle were types of the Messiah, bnt the great 
nations of the world under the Providence of 
God, prepared, one after another, the way for 
His coming. In the Book of Daniel we read 
of the great statue. The head of this statue 
was of fine gold, but the breast and arms of 
silver, the thighs of brass, the legs of iron, 
and the feet of iron and clay. *'This thou 
sawest till a stone was cut out of a mountain 
without hands, and it struck the statue upon 
the feet thereof that were of iron and of clay, 
and broke them to pieces, then was the iron, 
the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold 
broken to pieces together and became like 
chaff of a summer's threshing floor, and they 
were carried away by the wind, and there was 
no place found for them, but the stone that 
struck the statue, became a great mountain, 
and filled the whole earth. ' ' And these parts 
of the statues were the four kingdoms that 
prepared the world for the coming of Christ. 
The Babylonians among whom the Israelites 
were in captivity, punish them for their idol- 
atry, the Persian conquest brings about the 
birth of the Messiah in Judea. The Greeks 



24 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer, 

made easy the spread of tlie knowledge of 
Christ, the Romans by their rule over com- 
merce made easy the spread of the Gospel 
itself. 

And thus we see how these nations of the 
world in the designs of God looked forward to 
Christ. All was for Christ as Christ was 
for man and man for God, and the object 
veiled under the mysterious communications 
of the Old Testament, was Jesus Christ the 
Messiah. And so looking back to the begin- 
ning of time we behold the prophecies fore- 
telling the coming of Christ. He is promised 
to the human race in the Garden of Paradise, 
to Abraham, to Moses, to David. The thought 
of Him is the consolation of the people of 
Israel in their captivity in Babylon, and their 
joy grows stronger as the time comes nearer, 
and one by one the great facts predicted of 
Him are fulfilled. 

When we see what Almighty God has 
done to prepare the world for the coming of 
Christ, may we not ask Him by His divine 
grace to prepare our hearts, that we may see 
the light and follow it, that it may lead us to 
the knowledge and love of Jesus Christ, for 
*'to know God and Him whom He has sent 
Christ Jesus, This is eternal life." — 



11. CHRIST IN HISTORY. 

Christ is the central figure of the world. In 
the beginning, until His coming, Prophecy 
pointed forward to Him, and now backward 
history gazes, Sacred and Profane History, 
in wonder, admiration, enthusiasm, while the 
unbelief of the world seeks in vain to distort 
His divine character, or lessen veneration for 
His Sacred Memory. In vain I said, unbelief 
does this for without Christ the world is dead 
— a blank in creation ; in vain, for Christ was 
with the world in Hope from the beginning, 
he is with it now in His Bucharistic life. He 
will be with the redeemed world in the eternal 
glory of Heaven. 

To give the history of Christ we shall take 
the Old Testament and the New, the history 
of the Church and the history of the world, 
and each contributes its portion to the history 
of Him who made the world, and to whom 
the world turns for the words of Eternal Truth. 

The Old Testament may be called a Pro- 
phetic history, symbolical and figurative, tell- 
ing us of the elements of His character, the 

(25) 



26 Christ the Man God Our Eedeemer. 

New Testament is one long record of His 
miracles, the History of the Church an un- 
assailable witness of the power of Christ 
through all ages, and Profane History, a 
reliable although reluctant witness of the truth 
of the History of the Church. 

The appearance of Jesus Christ in the world 
was a marvellous event. His mission an 
extraordinary and divine success. But it was 
neither unexpected nor to be wondered at. 
During four centuries He had been anxiously 
awaited, and at the coming of the appointed 
time, there was a general movement among 
the Jews and among the enlightened intellects 
of progression. 

To the Jewish people the word Messias had 
been consecrated by its history, and traditions 
by its religious ceremonies and sacrifice, by 
its hopes and its fears. 

To the Gentiles it lent traditions, predic- 
tions, and instructive expectation of one who 
was to bring peace and happiness to the 
human race. It may be said, that at that 
period, the great question which filled the 
world was the coming of Jesus Christ. — The 
Jews asked John the Baptist if he were the 
Christ to come. The Samaritan Woman said: 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeeme>\ 27 

*'I know the Messias is to come^', and the 
Jews asked frequently — ''If you are the Christ 
tell us so, plainly." 

It may be said in perfect truth that the 
whole history of the human race before the 
birth of Christ is the history of the Redeemer 
and His Church, represented visibly by fig- 
ures, and announced by magnificent pro- 
phecies. — 

As, for Christ in Prophecy, we took the 
Old Testament as an authentic document, so 
for Christ in history, we take the New Testa- 
ment as a reliable document. It is said that 
a painter among the Jews wished to make a 
picture of Christ and used to stand in the 
multitude and watch His features. But so 
great was the supernatural beauty of that 
divine countenance, so holy the supernatural 
light that beamed from that sweetest of all 
faces of the most beautiful of the children of 
men, that his heart was lifted in rapture, and 
his eyes drank in the glorious vision, but he 
forgot the work he designed to do and his 
hand remained motionless and dared not to 
trace the outlines, lest one moment of that 
vision should be lost. And so when we speak 
of Christ it were far more fitting to be lost in 



28 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer, 

the adoration and the contemplation of His 
divine beauty than to picture in words, His 
life and character. 

**Such was the divine character of Jesus 
Christ, '* says a writer, ^Hhat none but a 
divine hand could paint it, and if we look in 
Prophecy for what Christ should be, we read 
there only what Christ really was, at the time 
when He lived among men." 

To form for ourselves a picture of Christ in 
history we shall take Him as presented to us 
in the New Testament, looking upon it as a 
true historical document. — We shall supple- 
ment this with another document of authentic 
history and for the fact of Christ^ s life and 
death, we shall take the record of the Jewish 
historian Josephus Flavins, who is called by 
Nicephon Cultister, *'the lover of truth** and 
by Milmo, historian of Jerusalem — *'An 
author not to be rejected when he writes 
against himself." — 

The Jewish historian Josephus says : **Now 
there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, 
if it is lawful to call Him a man, for He was 
a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such 
men as receive the truth with pleasure. He 
drew over to Him both many of the Jews and 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 29 

many of the Gentiles. He was the Christ, but 
when Pilate at the suggestion of the principal 
men among us had condemned Him to the 
cross, those that loved Him at the first did 
not forsake Him for He appeared to them 
alive again on the third day ; as the divine 
prophets had foretold these and ten thousand 
other wonderful things concerning Him. And 
the tribe of Christians, so named from Him, 
are not extinct at this day." — 

This gives us the historical fact of the life, 
death and resurrection of Christ. — The testi- 
mony comes from a Jew — whose interest 
it was to deny the existence of Christ, as they 
did not recognize Him as the Messiah, and 
yet is forced, when truthfully recording the 
life of the governor Pontius Pilate, to mention 
Christ, as he had mentioned the life and death 
of St. John the Baptist when recording the 
life of Herod, — *'John that was called the 
Baptist ; for Herod slew him who was a good 
man and commanded the Jews to exercise 
virtue, both as to righteousness toward one 
another, and piety towards God, and so to 
come to baptism. — He was sent a prisoner, 
out of Herod's suspicious temper to Machem, 
the castle I before mentioned, and was there 
put to death." 



30 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer, 

From this testimony we turn to that of the 
New Testament which tells us of the life, 
character, doctrine and resurrection of Jesus 
Christ. 

To use the words of an infidel philosopher: — 

"This divine book is the most necessary for 
a christian, and most useful to those who are 
not, for to meditate on it is enough to fill the 
soul with love for the author and the will to 
keep His commandments: — Never was worded 
an expression in such sweet language or with 
such energy and simplicity. — The words of 
philosophers with all their pomp, what are 
they beside it ? — Can we believe a work so 
wise, so sublime is the work of man, and that 
He who has written this wonderful history is 
not more than man ? Do we find in it the 
style of an enthusiast ? — What sweetness 
and purity of mind, what persuasive grace in 
His teaching ? What sublimity in His max- 
ims, what delicacy and justice in His answers? 
What empire over His passions? — '' 

We go back in spirit to the historical pic- 
ture of Christ given in the Gospel at the 
time when Caesar Augustus in his pride 
wished to enroll the Roman conquered 
world, and the Mother of Christ journeyed to 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 31 

Bethlehem, and He was born in a stable and 
laid in a manger. This was the sign given 
by Angel messengers to the shepherds as they 
watched their flocks, who rising in haste 
adored Him whose glory the Angels sang in 
the heavens. Later on wise kings journeyed 
far, and the prophecies directed them to 
Bethlehem where adoring the new born 
Saviour, they returned another w^ay to their 
own country, divinely warned that Herod 
sought the child's life. The divine narrative 
continues the history of the Christ child, 
His presentation in the temple, flight into 
Egypt and return, finding in the temple and 
thirty years of hidden life at Nazareth until the 
hour came for Him to go forth into the world 
and preach His doctrine. And here we learn 
the sublime beauty of that life. — His birth in 
the stable, His hidden life of thirty years was 
a disappointment to the world. Never would 
a great king enter on his reign in such fashion. 
And we look in wonder and admiration at 
that beautiful figure in the past, the centre 
of the world's hope, and the world's joy. 
Wherever His steps bore him. He brought 
joy and deeds of goodness, and health to the 
sick and suffering, and peace to the stricken 



32 Christ the Man God Our Bedcemcr. 

sinner, and comfort to the sad and sorro\Anng. 
And His passing was like the jDassing of glad- 
ness, for He left after Him the brightness of 
gladdened hearts. 

Then begins the record of the doing good 
of the loving heart of Christ. ''A leper came 
and adored Him saying, Lord if Thou wilt, 
Thou cans' t make me clean. And Jesus 
stretching forth His hand, touched him saying 
I will, be thou made clean, and forthwith his 
leprosy was cleansed. And there came to 
Him a centurion beseeching Him and saying : 
Ivord my servant lieth at home sick of the 
palsy and is grievously tormented, and Jesus 
said to him I will come and heal him : — And 
later, behold a great tempest arose in the sea, 
— and Jesus, rising up commanded the winds 
and the sea, and there came a great calm. — 

To the man sick of the palsy he said : Be 
of good heart my son, thy sins are forgiven 
thee ; and He raised from death the daughter 
of Jairus, and gave sight to the two blind 
men. — Then going to a City that is called 
Nain, and there went with Him His disciples 
and a great multitude, and when He came 
nigh to the City, behold a dead man was car- 
ried out, the only son of his mother and she 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer, 33 

was a widow, and a great multitude of the 
City was with her. Whom when the Lord 
had seen, being moved with mercy toward 
her, he said to her : weep not, and He came 
near and touched the bier, and they that car- 
ried it stood still ; and He said : young man, 
I say to thee arise, — and he that was dead 
sat up and began to speak, and He gave him 
to his mother. 

And behold a woman that was in the City, 
a sinner, when she knew that He sat at meat 
in the Pharisee's house — came and began to 
wash His feet with tears, and wiped them 
with the hairs of her head, and kissed His 
feet and anointed them with ointment. And 
He said to her : thy sins are forgiven thee. 
He pardoned the woman taken in adultery ; 
gives light and pardon to the Samaritan 
woman, and relates the parable of the Prodigal 
Son and the Lost Sheep. 

Then gathering and instructing His aposles, 
and founding His Church, He enters triumph- 
antly into Jerusalem shortly before the time 
He is to suffer His Passion and be crucified. 
Seized as a robber by the Jews, He is condemned 
by the Roman Governor Pilate, is scourged, 
crowned with thorns and crucified between two 



34 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 

thieves. This was the end of Christ in the 
Gospels, but the Acts of the Apostles give 
a further history of the early years of His 
Church. The followers of the Crucified One, 
increased day by day until the unbelieving 
world sought by slaughter to destroy them 
from the face of the earth. 

Christ came into the world's history in the 
stable at Bethlehem, but out of the world's 
history He, and His power and His name 
shall not go forth till that great judgment day 
places Him high upon His throne. King and 
Judge of all men, the living and the dead for 
life everlasting. — Though He has died — 
He has risen and His name and power live. 
— Saul on his way to Damascus heard that 
name — I am Jesus whom thou hast perse- 
cuted, and the light of Christ came to him 
and we know the event of Paul in history 
who knew only Jesus Christ crucified. Through 
the Apostles the Church of Christ grew and 
was strengthened and the Jews advanced to 
their own destruction. His miracles, then, as 
now, were resisted by the pride of the Jews, 
who in their blindness rejected the Messias 
who had been promised to them. 

After thirty-three years had passed away 



Christ the Man God Oar Eedeemer. 35 

there fell upon the unhappy people the fright- 
ful Roman War, that destroyed their City of 
Jerusalem and their Temple. We know the 
beauty of Solomon's first temple. The second 
temple was made still more glorious than the 
first, by the presence in it of Christ. And 
now that He had come and gone and His 
people had rejected Him for whose home that 
temple was built, it was to be destroyed. 
Both Jewish and Pagan historians record the 
threatening signs of God's anger against this 
people, for years before its destruction. 

For seven years and five months, the son of 
Ananus, 'named Jesus, told of the coming doom. 
Suddenly during the feast of the tabernacles 
he raised his voice in terrible warning : *'A 
voice from the West, a voice from the four 
winds ! A voice against Jerusalem and the 
temple ! A voice against the bridegroom and 
the bride ! A voice against the people. ' ' Day 
and night he cried the same dread boding of 
evil, and though punished for a time never 
ceased his cry. Woe, woe to Jerusalem, and 
thus ever the sad prophecy was repeated till 
one day upon the ramparts he cried : "woe to 
me also" and was struck dead by a stone from 
the engines of the enemy. When in the siege 



36 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 

of the City, after unspeakable miseries of 
famine, where, to tell all in a word, a mother 
killed, roasted and devoured her own child, 
and the very soldiers fled from the place in 
horror, the Roman Titus looked into the City 
and made it heap of ruins about the temple. 
A soldier against the order of Titus threw a 
brand into the approach to the sanctuary, 
and the cedar wood took fire, and no human 
power could quench the flames and so on the 
same day and month, that Nebuchadnezzar 
destroyed the first temple of Solomon, the 
second temple built by Herod fell a prey, 
with the City, to the flames. It was after the 
destruction of Jerusalem that the Gospel of 
Christ was preached more directly to the Gen- 
tiles, and when the name and religion of 
Christ spread rapidly, they resolved to root 
it out. There began the cruel onslaught 
against all who bore the name of Christ. 
They were forced to bear horrible torments 
or abjure their faith. They were scourged, 
torn by wild beasts, burned with torches, 
boiled in oil, mutilated and crucified. Others 
were burned with hot iron plates, or stifled 
with smoke — others tied in sacks with ser- 
pents and flung into the sea. The enemies 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 37 

of Christ sought to destroy His name, and 
the whole city of Antandino was burned 
because the inhabitants refused to give up 
their allegiance to Christ. At Rome, two 
million and a half of martyrs, gave their blood 
for the name and love of Christ, and the whole 
number is computed at 11,000,000 of martyrs. 

And as we go down the tide of ages we find 
the name and the memory and the spirit of 
Christ the foremost object in the world's 
history. 

"For the name, and the memory, and the 
love of Christ we behold men sacricing all 
that is dear to the human heart, fleeing to the 
desert, to avoid the fascination and dangers 
of sin of the world. For the memory and 
love of Christ in the nth Century, the Cru- 
saders were willing to pour out their hearts' 
blood in the effort to rescue from desecration 
the sacred Tomb where the body of Christ had 
lain, and as Christ and His name had been a 
sign of contradiction to the Jews who rejected 
Him, so in the i6th Century, the world had 
grown wear}^ of the holy beautiful life taught 
it by Christ, it chafed against the restraint 
and checks placed on a life of pleasure and 
sin by the pure life and the self denial taught 



38 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer, 

by Christ, and it protested against Him, the 
way, the truth and the life, and became pro- 
testant, and that Protestant world under the 
leadership of Luther, lost its way to God, and 
the truth of Christ was darkened, and it fell 
away a dead branch from the Church of God, 
it kept the name of Christian but not the 
reality of the life of Christ. And as across 
the sandy wastes of the African desert the 
skeletons mark the line where the caravan of 
life has passed, so the lifeless forms of dead 
religions point out in the world's history, the 
truth of the coming and the life and the 
religion of Christ." 

"And so we press on in this great tide of 
history and ever and anon we find its course 
marked by the desolations or self-sacrifice of 
those who accepted the teachings of Christ, 
or by the wreck of those who reject the Saviour 
of men. — And thus sweeping on we come to 
the 1 8th and 19th Centuries, the age of 
skepticism and infidelity, when up against this 
grand figure of the reality of Jesus Christ in per- 
son, with His Church and His teaching wit- 
nessed to by the historians of the world, wit- 
nessed to by the testimony of astounding mir- 
acles, witnessed to by the blood of eleven mil- 



Christ the Man God Our Medeemer. 39 

lions of martyrs, witnessed to by the faith of all 
nations, and the unspoken testimony of 1800 
years against all this is set up the petty fiction 
of a contemptible Strauss or a blasphemous 
Renan. What a scorn to the human intellect 
that it gives to such men aught but oblivion 
and contempt." 

''This is eternal life to know God and Him 
whom He has sent Jesus Christ." 

We have been endeavoring to know Jesus 
Christ. We have considered Christ in Pro- 
phecy and Christ in History. We have gone 
back to the beginning of time and listened to 
the voices of the Prophets as they gradually 
unfolded to us the knowledge of the great one 
who was to come in the fulness of time. We 
have seen the prophecies verified in the Mes- 
sias, and Christ alone was the one who ful- 
filled all that was foretold by those who pene- 
trated the mysteries of the future. We have 
called attention to the prophecies and their 
fulfilment in Christ. Then we have taken 
the light of history which deals with facts and 
with truth, and we have followed the life of 
Christ from His birth at Bethlehem, His life 
at Nazareth, His miracles and teaching, the 
foundation of His Church, His suffering and 



40 Christ the Man God Oar Redeemer, 

death, His resurrection, and the influence of 
His life, teaching and memory upon the his- 
tory of the world. Its power among the mar- 
tyrs, the Crusaders, among men good and 
evil, down the Centuries to the centuries of 
the infidelity and rationalist of our days. 

We have pictured before us this grand 
character. We have Him before us in proph- 
ecy from the beginning of time, we look back 
at Him through history as the central figure 
in the thoughts of men, and we have before 
us Christ in Prophecy and Christ in History. 
We have Him there as a fact. I have not 
shown to you in detail, except as foretold in 
Prophecy as recorded in history. And now 
the question comes — Who is Christ? — Who 
is this Christ, foretold in prophecy, recorded 
in history. This Christ is the Man God, Our 
Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the Second 
Person of the adorable Trinity, true God and 
true man, who took our human nature to 
redeem us from our sins. 



III. CHRIST THE GOD MAN. 

God prepared the world by prophecies for 
Ihe coming of Jesus Christ. We have seen 
how history shows us the life of Christ ful- 
filling every detail of those prophecies. It is 
now intended to make clear the teaching of 
the Church with regard to this same Christ 
of Prophecy and of History, — to place before 
you as plainly and as simply as so sublime a 
mystery will allow, the dignity of Christ as 
God and man, and the work of love He has 
done for us as our Redeemer. 

The mystery of the Incarnation, that mystery 
by which the Son of God the Second person 
of the Blessed Trinity united to Himself our 
human nature, is so wonderful an act of God's 
love, that it could never have entered into 
man's mind to imagine it. God alone could 
have planned and executed it. 

Now what do we mean by saying that 
Christ is the Man-God ? We mean, that He 
who is the Messias, who is Christ, is at the 
same time a being that is the Second Person 
of the Trinity having the divine nature and 

(41) 



42 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer, 

the human nature. We shall show from reve- 
lation, on the authority of the sacred Scrip- 
tures, that Christ is God, or the Divinity of 
Christ, and at the same time that He was man, 
that is, had perfect human nature, (i) The 
Divinity of Christ is shown from the prepar- 
ation for His coming in the prophecies, in 
His incarnation and by the life of Christ on 
earth. 

In other words he was prepared, as God, 
became man, as God, lived upon earth, as God. 
The prophecies were verified in Christ, and in 
no other. These prophecies of the Messias 
who was Christ, spoke of Him as God. The 
prophet Baruch says of Him ''This is our 
God, He was seen upon earth and conversed 
among men.'* — The prophet Micheas speak- 
ing of Him tells us He is eternal. — "His 
going forth is from the beginning from the 
days of eternity." This could be said only of 
a God, and was said of Christ. — The prophet 
Zacharias says "I will pour out upon the 
house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusa- 
lem the spirit of grace and of prayers.'' It 
is Christ speaking, and the power to give the 
spirit of grace and of prayer, could come only 
from God. So, from the words of the prophets, 
Christ is really God. 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 43 

But it is not from the proj^liets alone that 
we derive the knowledge of the Divinity of 
Jesus Christ. The very narrative of the 
mystery of the Incarnation shows to us the 
divine nature of the being that is born. In 
this adorable mystery we find the concurrence 
of God, of Angels and of men. Of God, for 
it was the Son of God who became man ; of 
mankind for the Blessed Virgin gave her 
maternal cooperation to this great mystery ; 
of Angels, for the Angel Gabriel was the mes- 
senger from the Father to the Virgin of 
Nazareth 

"Behold," said this Angel to Mary, "thou 
shalt conceive in the womb and bear a son, 
and thou shalt call His name Jesus." (L^uc. 
I. 31.) "Therefore the holy One that shall 
be born of thee shall be called the Son of 
God. ' * The Divine Word remaining in the 
bosom of the Father, in the divine family of 
the Trinity, goes forth to join human nature 
to itself, and bring it into that divine family. 
By the power of the most High, Mary became 
the real Mother of Christ, for the Second Per- 
son of the Trinity without ceasing to be God, 
a divine person, is clothed with human nature 
in the womb of the Virgin Mary, so that the 



44 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer, 

Person born of the Virgin Mary is God. That 
Person is Christ, is her Son, the Son of God, 
true God and true man. He is true God, and 
true man having a human body and a human 
soul. In this Son of God, Christ, there are 
two natures, the divine nature and the human 
natnre which the one person of Christ, so 
united in himself, that the divinity cannot be 
ever divided from the humanity, nor the hu- 
manity from the divinity. 

Wherefore Christ is perfect God and perfect 
man, in the unity of one person ; but because 
there are two natures in Christ, there are not 
therefore two persons, but one. It was only 
the Second person that became man, for He 
alone took human nature into the unity of His 
person. The person of the Father, and per- 
son of the Holy Ghost did not assume human 
nature, did not become incarnate, it was the 
Second person only that became incarnate. 
In the two natures of Christ are the three sub- 
stances the Word, the Soul, and the Body, to 
avoid the misunderstanding, that the Person 
of the Word, took the place of the human 
sold; as Christ was perfect man, he has the 
soul and body of man, and this perfect human 
nature is united to the Word. 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 45 

Everything therefore, about the Incarnation 
of Christ shows Him to be God. 

We shall point out, moreover, that the 
Divinity of Christ is proved by His life. 

First — from the words of Christ, the power 
of Christ in the physical world, and the power 
of Christ in the moral world. 

The words of Christ prove Him to be God. 
When He replied to the High Priest who said 
*'I adjure thee by the living God to tell us if 
thou art the Christ the Son of God.'' Jesus 
said to him, ''Thou hast said it." In other 
words "I am the Christ the Son of God," and 
again to the Jews *'I am the beginning who 
speak to you." "I and the Father are one". 
And when the Jews took up stones to kill 
Him, He did not retract His words when He 
saw they understood Him to mean He was 
God, but answered "If men are called Gods, 
because God spoke to them, how much more 
I, because the Father hath sanctified me and 
sent me into the world." 

Again as to His attributes, our I^ord says, 
"Amen, Amen, I say unto you, before Abra- 
ham was, I am." (John VIII-58). There, 
our I^ord takes to Himself the attribute of 
Eternity which belongs only to God. 



46 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

''Whatsoever tilings tlie Father doth, the 
Son doth also in like manner" (John V-19). 

Christ sends the Holy Ghost in His own 
name as the Father does. "The Holy Spirit 
whom the Father will send in my name he 
will teach you all things.'^ "I shall send to 
yon from the Father the Spirit of truth," that 
is the Holy Spirit. 

Christ appeals to the miracles as to the 
truth of what He teaches, as motives of Faith, 
and it is evident that what is false, cannot be 
proved by miracles, as they are a work of 
God, above the power of nature, and God is 
the witness, and cannot witness to falsehood. 

Not only has Christ been proved to be God 
by His incarnation and by His words, but also 
the power He manifests over the physical 
world shows Him to be God. There was no 
limit to the exercise of His power. At the 
wedding of Cana in Galilee He changed water 
into wine ; when the tempest rose upon the 
sea, one word from those divine lips: "Peace, 
be still" and the waves subsided into calm, 
and the winds were hushed; He walked upon 
the waves of the Lake ; and fed the five 
thousand by the multiplication of the loaves. 
— At the sound of that divine voice the dead 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 47 

Lazarus came forth, the blind saw, the leper 
was healed, and the Son of the Widow of 
Nairn rose from his bier of death, and sj^oke. 
But other saints and holy men performed 
wonderful miracles. None of those great 
men claimed that they were divine, but their 
miracles proved that their mission was from 
God and proved the truth of their teaching. 
As in the Acts of the Apostles, those who had 
not that mission failed ; the evil spirits who 
obeyed Paul would not obey the Jewish ex- 
orcists. But Christ claimed that He was God, 
and appealed to these miracles as testimony 
of His divinity, and as the miracles of the 
saints proved their claims to be true, so the 
miracles of Christ proved Him to be God, 
since God, the author of miracles, could not 
sanction them, or be witness to what was 
false. 

And as for the physical world, so for the 
moral and social world, it can be shown that 
Christ by teaching the virtues of self-denial, 
poverty, humility, before unknown, by the 
influence of that teaching upon the social 
w^orld, not for a time, but for all ages, showed 
the influence of divine power that could pro- 
ceed from no cause less than that infinite 
power. 



48 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

And thus from tlie Prophecies, from the In- 
carnation, from the words of Christ, His 
power over the physical and moral world, the 
prophecies at His death, and His resurrection, 
Christ is proved to be God. But Christ was 
not only God. Christ was truly 7nan, 

The Messias spoken of in the prophecies 
was a true man, and this Messias we have 
seen is Christ, since no other verified those 
prophecies, and hence Christ is true man ; for 
He is of the family of David and heir to his 
throne. He is called by Daniel the Son of 
man, and in countless places gives Himself 
the same name. And if He were not true 
man, He would have deceived all by His 
words and actions, and have made His Apos- 
tles witnesses of falsehood. But all admit 
that Christ was good, and could not have done 
this ; and hence, it must be that He was true 
man. 

In Christ there was a real physical body; 
we see this in His childhood, in His life, and 
after His resurrection, when, to prove the 
reality of this body, that He was not a spirit. 
He said to His Apostles ''See my hands and 
my feet, touch and see, for a spirit has not 
flesh and bones as you see me to have.'* So 
Christ has a true human body. 



Christ the Man God Our Eedeemer. 49 

Christ also had a rational soul. He had 
such a soul, if He had the same manifesta- 
tions as other men, and these manifestations 
Christ made, as did other men. For He was 
sad — in the Garden of Olives ''My soul is sor- 
rowful unto death" — He was in joy "I rejoice 
for your sakes" He wept over Jerusalem — and 
at the tomb of Lazarus. But all these were 
signs of a rational soul, which consequently 
Christ had, or His life would have been a 
most utter deception, contrary to truth, to His 
own repeated utterances, to the testimony of 
the prophets and of His disciples. 

In Christ the soul and body were substan- 
tially united in one nature, and this human 
nature, consisting of both body and soul, was 
assumed by the Second person of the Blessed 
Trinity in unity of person. 

In the Bull of Pope Eugenius the IV. 
"Cantate Domino", we have the teaching of 
the Catholic Church . ' ' The most Holy Roman 
Church believes, professes and proclaims that 
one person of the Trinity, true God, the Son 
of God begotten of the Father, consubstantial 
with the Father and coeternal, in the fulness 
of time, which the inscrutable depth of the 
divine wisdom so determined for the salvation 



50 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer, 

of the human race, assumed the true and 
entire nature of man, from the immaculate 
womb of the Virgin Mary, and united it to 
Himself in unity of person by such a unity 
that whatever is there, of God, is not separate 
from man, and whatever is of man, is not 
divided from the deity, and is one and the 
same undivided, each nature remaining with 
its own proper qualities, God and man, the 
Son of God and the Son of man, equal to the 
Father according to His Divinity; less than 
the Father according to His humanity, im- 
mortal and eternal from the nature of His 
Divinity, passible and temporal from the con- 
dition of His assumed humanity." 

She condemns those who did not understand 
the personal union, and denied that He was 
true God and said He was a mere man. — She 
condemns the Manichaeans who said that 
Christ had not a real human body, and those 
who said that He received from the Virgin a 
heavenly body. — She condemned him who 
said that Christ in His human nature had no 
soul, but that this was supplied by the Deity, 
and historians who asserted that in Christ 
there were two persons — as they acknowledge 
two natures. But this would not have been 



CJirlst the Man God Our Bedeemer. 51 

the Son of God becoming man, it would have 
been the Son of God living in a man. — She 
condemns Eutyches who would have one 
nature, and then Christ would have been 
either man or God, the humanity would have 
been changed into the Divinity or the Divinity 
into humanity. — She condemns Macarius of 
Antioch, who said that in Christ there was 
but one operation and one will — where the 
Church teaches that in Christ there were two 
wills, the divine will and the human will, 
and likewise two operations the divine and 
the human. 

I have said that the Church of Christ alone 
teaches Christ clearly, and the Church of 
Christ is the Catholic Church. Ask a Pro- 
testant what he believes of Christ. Ask the 
ministers of any religion what they teach 
positively of Christ? Is He truly man-God. — 
Did He have human soul and body? Does 
the person of the word take the place of the 
soul? They will not answer you. They 
have no positive, certain doctrine which they 
could teach or dare to teach with authority, 
or if they do so teach, their doctrine is taken 
openly or otherwise from the Catholic Church. 
They appeal to the Gospels as explained by 



52 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 

the Church, or the interpretation of the 
Fathers, or Catholic Tradition. In other 
words, apart from the Catholic Church, they 
can teach nothing of Christ. 

The Catholic Church teaches plainly, 
clearly, unmistakably: Jesus Christ is the Son 
of God the Second Person of the Blessed 
Trinity, true God and true man. In Christ 
there is one person, the person of the word, 
and two natures, the nature of God and the 
nature of man. These two natures are dis- 
tinct, yet are united in one person, the person 
of the word, and the acts of Christ, being 
attributable to the person, are the acts of God. 
His human nature is perfect human nature, 
He has a human body and a human soul, 
complete in its human nature, and the person 
of the Word does not supply the place of the 
soul, for the body and the soul are substantially 
united, and this human nature is assumed by 
the person of the word. We may understand 
how human nature remains unchanged and is 
still assumed by the word, by an illustration: 

Suppose we have a tower, with an extended 
roof, now a second tower may be built up so 
that it may be covered by the extended roof 
of the first tower. Thus, human nature 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 53 

would be that tower which is complete in 
itself, and is covered by the personality of 
the divine nature. Each nature remaining 
distinct, as the two towers are distinct, yet 
both towers covered by one roof, as the per- 
sonality of the word supplies the personality 
of the human nature, but the divinity does 
not replace the human soul, since in Christ 
there is soul and body, as well as the Word. 
When we understand the meaning of the In- 
carnation, the clearness of the union between 
God and human nature, our minds seem 
paralyzed at the greatness of the mystery, our 
hearts almost cease to beat at realizing the 
love of God for us. It is a thought so 
sublime, it could never have been invented 
by man. Is is the work of an infinite God 
alone. 

Man had fallen away from his nearness to 
God by grace. He fell away from God and 
sank into an abyss so far out of sight of God, 
that the distance seems infinite. What could 
bridge over the chasm that separated man 
from his God? That poor fallen degraded 
human nature, how find its way to God? And 
the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity — 
God, said: — I will make that human nature, 



54 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

mine, I sliall unite myself to it by a union so 
close, that the actions of human nature, shall 
be the actions of God — and poor human 
nature, by the ineffable love of God was lifted 
up by the Incarnation so that we can say, I 
am a human being, God has united my nature 
to Himself so that there is an individual 
nature united to God, thus lifting up the 
whole human race, to the rank of a brother 
of Jesus Christ. When a prince unites him- 
self by marriage to a family, the whole family 
is honored by the alliance, and thus the 
whole human race is honored by the union 
with human nature, of the person of a God — 
and here, we see the condescension of God, 
the self-annihilation of the Second Person of 
the Blessed Trinity, to lay aside the splendor 
of His Glory and shroud it in the veil of 
humanity. He hides his majesty under the 
form of the infant at Bethlehem, and lets His 
love hide even this humanity under the sacra- 
mental veil of the Eucharist. And why all 
this love? This union with man? In order 
that man might have some one to atone for 
his sins. Man alone could not make repa- 
ration to the offended majesty, for though he 
could suffer, he had not the required dignity 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 55 

to repair the insult. God alone, though He 
had the required majesty, could not suffer, to 
repair the injury. Hence the necessity of 
the union, a man to suffer, a God to elevate 
that suffering and make it worthy the majesty 
of God. And this is the mystery of the 
Redemption. Christ the Man-God, is the 
only one able, worthy and willing to make 
reparation to God for man's sin. He is our 
Redeemer — without Him we were lost for- 
ever — He came to suffer and die that we 
might live. He gave Himself a redemption 
for us all. He bore our sorrows — He was 
wounded for our iniquity— He released us 
from sin — reconciled us to God, redeemed us 
from slavery and gave Himself up for us. 
*' Christ loved us and washed us from our sins 
in His blood." 

And so, standing at the food of the cross, 
and looking at the bleeding figure of Christ I 
say in my heart — This is Christ — the Second 
Person of the Adorable Trinity — my God, 
who created me, who took human nature that 
I might be nearer to Him, that He might 
call me His brother, and He is my God, that 
He might live in suffering and poverty and 
die in agony for my sins. This is my God, 



56 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer, 

my Jesus. — And what had I done for Him? 
Rather, what had I done against Him? But 
He loved me and delivered Himself up for 
me. He was wounded for my iniquity. 

And as I gaze upon that figure of Christ 
upon the Cross, it becomes for me a reality, 
the living form of Christ, and I see behind it 
the altar where He is the living sacrifice in 
the sacrament of His love — and I see above 
the cross the crown of glory that will be the 
reward of those who live the life of Christ, 
believe in Him, and follow Him in suffering 
and sorrow. And I remember, the life of a 
Christian must be a life with Jesus Crucified, 
and I see upon the crown these words in 
letters of light — ' ' Is it not worth while , ' ' — and 
my heart gives forth that act of Faith which 
will be carried into every action of my life. 
Jesus Christ, true God, and true man, my 
God, my friend, my Saviour, I believe in 
Thee and love Thee with my whole heart and 
soul, and with all my strength and all my 
mind. Give me the grace to serve Thee on 
earth, that I may see the beauty of Thy 
divine face in the glory of heaven. 

*'This is Eternal Life to know God and Him 
whom He has sent Jesus Christ." This is 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 57 

what we have hoped to do, to know better 
Jesus Christ Our Lord, to know Him in the 
reality with which he was awaited, for four 
thousand years, to know Him in the reality 
of history when He lived on this earth of 
ours, to know Him as the God-man, but not 
as one far away, but as one near and dear to 
us. To remember, that Jesus Christ from the 
beginning knew your individual soul and 
loved you. Before the eyes of the little child 
at Bethlehem every soul that went from life 
into Eternity, passed for judgment. Our 
souls were before His divine eyes then, as 
when they were covered with the mist of blood 
in the agony of death, and it was love that 
covered those eyes in the darkness of death 
for you and for me. 

If we can remember the reality of Jesus 
Christ, of His love for us, and live consistently 
with that thought, we are saved, we have 
gained Eternal Life, for we have learned to 
know Jesus Christ. 



Here is the material from which to paint a 
true picture of Christ. This was the study of 
Giotto, of Da Vinci, of Luini, this the study 
of a Mueller, an Ittenbach, an Ary Schaeffer, 



58 Christ the Man God Oar Redeemer, 

a Delia Robbia, and only tbe artist who enters 
into the sublimity of the original reality by 
study and prayer and contemplation can paint 
a picture that will have in it the immortal 
breath of genius, to keep within that picture 
life, after the close of the twentieth century, 
upon the threshhold of which we are about 
to stand 



IV. CHRI5T IN THE flODERN WORLD. 

It is not surprising that men wondered 
when Christ commanded the winds and the 
waves ; but it is strange that having received 
the answer who Christ is, they should still 
wonder that, at the sound of His voice, the 
winds and the waves should be still. It is not 
known that winds and waves ever obe3^ed the 
power of man. How uncontrollable and in- 
tangible are the winds of a mighty tempest ! 
how restless and unchanging to the human 
voice are the surging waves of the sea ! 

If we look into the scenes of human history 
we shall find how little heed the winds or 
waves have given to the power of the human 
voice. 

The greatest of the world's poets has por- 
trayed for us an aged king, once powerful, 
standing, almost alone, upon the heath, his 
heart broken by the ingratitude of his chil- 
dren, while the tempest rages about him and 
pays little heed to his venerable locks or the 
sound of his aged voice, the winds obey not 
his voice even though he be a king. And 

(59) 



6o Christ tJie Man God Our Redeemer. 

there was yet another king, who, history tells 
us, in answer to His flatterers, who said that 
all things were under his sway, placed his 
throne beside the advancing waves of the sea, 
and commanded them to come no further; but 
we know that the waves obeyed not his voice, 
but came in their irresistible tide, and splashed 
against the feet of the monarch, heeding his 
voice no more than if he were the merest babe 
or the tiniest shell upon the strand. Wind 
and wave, those unruly elements, obey the 
voice of no man, and therefore it was, that 
when men saw that at the sound of the voice 
of Christ the mighty winds and the restless 
waves were still, they wondered and said — 
who is this? Who is Christ? 

And as this picture of Christ stilling the 
tempest stands out so beautifully painted for 
us by the Evangelist, we instinctively ask the 
same question Who is He that even the winds 
and the waves obey Him? And to find the 
answer to that question our minds turn from 
the picture of the tempest to four grand pict- 
ures in the history of the world. 

These pictures are painted on a canvass 
broader than the lives of men. The subjects 
are taken from different stages of the world's 



Christ the 3fan God Our Eedeemer. 6i 

history, they are outlined by the Divine hand 
of God and the colors are blended or marred 
by the thoughts and the volitions of the human 
soul. Who is He that even the winds and 
the waves obey Him? and we see the answer 
in those four great pictures — Christ in the 
Darkness — Christ on the Mountain — Christ in 
the Modern World— Christ in the Soul. Who 
is He? Who is Christ? — What is revealed 
by the first x^icture — Christ in the Darkness? 
When the light of grace, which was in the 
soul of the first man went up out of the world, 
a darkness lowered down and lay brooding 
over the whole earth. It was the darkness of 
sin, in it was the reign of death, and in that 
kingdom of gloom there was separation from 
God, pain, sadness and despair. Men had 
lost God, and Satan had been chosen in His 
place, their hope was gone, and their joy lost. 
Must they live on in the darkness, till it 
merges into everlasting gloom? — 

Through God's mercy, into that darkness 
there came a light, a light of hope, a light of 
promise. Christ was to come ! He w^ho 
could command wind and wave was to come, 
and that same power of His could dispel the 
deadly darkness and crush the head of the 



6z Christ the Man God Our Redeemer, 

serpent that lurked therein. The bitterness 
of the gloom was gone, for a light had come 
to brighten it, and that light was the promise 
of the Christ to come — and during that long 
period, we see in the picture the finger of 
prophecy pointing to the light to cheer on the 
weary ones in the darkness, and they gaze 
eagerly towards the light and their faces grow 
brighter as the time goes on, until the gloom 
lifts up from the world and the star of Beth- 
lehem ushers into it — Christ the light of the 
world — and as we gaze upon the picture in 
the time of the Patriarchs, and in the time of 
Moses, and in the days of David, we see the 
light growing brighter and brighter, and our 
faith grows stronger and stronger as we be- 
hold more and more clearly the verifications 
of the prophecies in the person of Christ the 
Saviour. 

In the time of the Patriarchs, we hear the 
promise to Abraham * 'In thee all the nations of 
the earth shall be blessed." In the time of 
Moses, we learn that "the Star of Baalam which 
rise from Jacob", and in the time of David, we 
know that He called the son of David — and 
of their prophecies we see the fulfilment in 
Christ. In the words of St. Matthew (I. i) 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 63 

*'The generation of Jesus Christ, the Son of 
David, the Son of Ahraham". In the words 
of St. Paul to the Galatians (III. 16) *'In 
Him are fulfilled the promises to Isaac, Jacob 
and Juda'\ — 

And looking to this first picture of Christ in 
the darkness, the answer comes back to the 
question, ''who is He that the winds and the 
waves obey Him?" "He is Christ". He is 
the One promised to Adam, to Abraham, to 
Moses, to David. Promised in the words of 
Isaias, ''behold a Virgin shall conceive and 
bear a son' ' foretold as the Christ that was to 
be killed after the seventy-two weeks, by 
Daniel. He is the one to be sent before the 
sceptre should pass from Judah. — Who is He? 
He is the promised Christ. — Christ the light 
of the World — Christ in the darkness. — He 
is Christ the Messiah to come. 

And from Christ in the darkness we pass to 
the second picture which begins with the 
figure of Christ at Bethlehem. This is Christ 
on the Mountain. Here the outlines of the 
first picture are filled in. For we behold Him 
who was spoken of in the darkness. He is 
one born of a Virgin, of the family of Abraham 
and David. Born at the time foretold by 



64 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

Jacob, after the time predicted by Daniel. 
There is His Life open to all men, they see 
Him and hear Him and touch Him and He 
grows in wisdom and age and grace before 
their very eyes. He heals the palsied, gives 
sight to the blind, raises the dead to life, and 
stills the winds and the sea — who is He that 
even the winds and the waves obey Him? 
Who is He that can give strength and steadi- 
ness to the palsied limbs, bring back to the 
eye of darkness the glorious joy of the light- 
some day, who breathes again the soul into 
the motionless corpse? Who is He? He is 
the Christ. For He who does all things is 
the only one who fulfills all prophecies. He 
alone is the one who comes at that hour who 
is of the family of David, who is born of a 
Virgin. It is certain that the prophecies of 
the Messiah have all been fulfilled — but they 
have been fulfilled only in Christ in this one 
who fills men with wonder at His words and 
works, therefore. He alone, Christ is the 
Messiah foretold from the beginning. Who 
is He? He is Christ. And who is Christ? 
He is the Messiah. And who is this Christ? 
the Messiah? He is the Son of the Living 
God. No other but this Christ was slain in 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 65 

the last of the seventy-two weeks, in no other 
are verified the Psahns of David which sang 
of the Saviour to come, as in the passion and 
death of Christ. There upon the mountain 
Christ was crucified, who in His birth, life 
and death fulfilled all that was foretold by the 
prophets. He it is who was called at His 
birth by the Angel, the Son of the Most High, 
and at His death by the centurion, the Son of 
God. 

In the prophecies He is referred to as God, 
He was incarnate as God, and He lived upon 
earth as God. The prophet Baruch says of 
Him *'This is our God who was upon earth 
and lived with men' ' . The Angel called Him 
the Son of God, and He, Himself said that 
He and the Father were one, and called upon 
His works in testimony of that truth, and the 
living God who was before the Jewish people, 
the prophecies in His infancy and in His 
public life ; in His passion and in His death, 
like the house upon the mountain side, 
visible to all ; in Him they refused to believe. 
For when they had seen Him crucified, and 
buried and risen again, they were and are still 
watching. 



66 Christ the Man God Our Eedeemer. 

So the Jewish race who from their 
prophecies had been waiting for the com- 
ing of the Messiah, when He came, 
shut their eyes and now are sitting on the 
mountain watching in vain for the Christ 
who has come and gone. 

Christ in the Modern World : — 

Here we are brought face to face with the 
third picture that of Christ and the Modern 
World. After the lapse of eighteen hundred 
years He who was to be sign of contradiction 
is a central figure in the Modern World, and 
with the Spirit of Caiphas, and the injustice 
of Pilate, and the insults of Herod, the 
Modern World says of Christ, — Who is 
He? The Modern World is drawn to Christ, 
but it reaches Him only in part. It would 
be more pleased with Him were He to lay 
aside His Divinity and impose fewer obliga- 
tions. The Modern World shuts its eyes 
to the light of prophecy of our first picture, 
and imitates the infidelity of the Jews by 
slumbering on the mountain when Christ is 
standing before them. With the majesty and 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 67 

beauty of Christ before tliem tliey are com- 
pelled to ask — who is He? And when the 
answer conies He is Jesus Christ, the Living 
God who has come to teach men a divine life, 
to be humble and pure and submissive to 
God, forgiving and patient of suffering, and 
unless one be made conformable to His image, 
he shall not enter the kingdom of God. 
They answer in their pride and passion. No, 
this cannot be. We have our own intellects — 
no one may teach us. And because the teach- 
ing of Christ, the command to do good and 
avoid wrong is a reproach to their own lives, 
they seek to reject Him, and they deny, not 
only the Divinity of Christ, but even the ex- 
istence of God and of their own soul. 

They verify already those words of St. Paul 
^'Know also this, that in the last days shall 
come on dangerous times. Men shall be 
lovers of themselves, covetous, haughty, 
proud, blasphemous, disobedient to parents, 
ungrateful, wicked, without affection, without 
peace, slanderers, incontinent, unmerciful, 
without kindness. Traitors, stubborn, puffed 
up, and lovers of pleasure more than of God. 
Having an appearance indeed of Godliness, 
but denying the power thereof — ever learning, 



68 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 

and never attaining the knowledge of the 
truth these also resist the faith, men corrupted 
in mind, reprobate concerning the faith". — 
Such is the picture given by St. Paul that 
may represent the Modern World that opposes 
the teaching of Christ. 

^ 'There are men at this day" says one of 
our great English Cardinals "who consider 
themselves intellectual, openly denying the 
existence of the soul ; and who having denied 
the existence of the soul, deny the existence 
of right and wrong. They tell us that right 
and wrong, and the instincts, dictates and 
rebukes of our conscience, are arbitrary 
associations of pleasure and pain, connected 
with certain actions by the continual tradition 
in which they are brought up. If so, then 
there is no such thing as law, either human 
or divine, and if no such thing as law, then 
no such thing as sin or crime, and therefore, 
no such thing as justice; and if no such thing 
as justice, there is no such thing as injustice, 
and if there be no such thing as intrinsic 
right, there is no such thing as intrinsic 
wrong, and if not, then we are in a world 
which has no more right, order, sweetness 
or beauty, and are turned back again into 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 69 

the original state of creation void and 
empty, and darkness rests upon the face of 
the deep.'* This then is what the Modern 
World reaches in turning away from Him. It 
is truly a picture of Christ and the Dark- 
ness. 

Who is He that even the winds and the 
waves obey Him? What a contrast to this is 
that picture of surpassing beauty the work 
of Jesus Christ in the soul. At the sound of 
the voice of Christ, the soul is in adoration 
before Him. It sees the light of His Divine 
countenance and knows that He is its Lord 
and its God. Knowing as we do who Christ 
is, that He is the Son of the Living God, 
knowing what He has done for our souls 
to save us from sin, what will the generous 
soul say to Him save the words of Thomas 
**My Lord and my God.'* 

What will the generous soul cry out but 
as St. Peter did, "to whom shall we go but 
to Thee?" for Thou hast the words of 
Eternal Life. Thou art Christ the Son of 
the Living God. We know that He is 
Christ, we believe that He is God, but 
there is a work for us to do in our own 
lives to show our love and our loyalty to 



70 Christ the 3£an God Our Bedeemer. 

Christ, your Master and your King. In days 
like ours, wlien the spirit of infidelity seeks 
to ignore the Divinity of Jesus Christ, when 
the spirit of a sensual world deadens the love 
in a Christian soul for its Lord and its God, 
there is a double duty for every Christian. 
There is the duty of his own life's destinies, 
there is a duty of atonement and reparation 
for those who do not love our Divine Master. 
For us Jesus Christ is a reality that enters in- 
to our lives and our hopes. The whole life of 
a Christian is spent in the presence of Jesus. 
The Divine Life of the Saviour is the model 
of his life, and in his soul, day after day, and 
year after year, the image of Jesus Christ 
should grow more and more distinguisliable,in 
that soul destined to reflect the image of its 
God. 

Year after year, men grow older, some grow 
richer, and some grow to seek more fully their 
own selfish passions, but year after year the 
Christian should grow holier, richer in the 
graces of the Kingdom of God, more and 
more divested of self in order to put on Jesus 
Christ. 

Who is He, that even the winds and the 
waves obey Him? Where are the winds 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 71 

like the passious that sweep over the human 
soul, where are the waves as restless as the 
agitation of the heart of man that lives in the 
facination and the excess of modern life, who 
will check those passions, who will calm that 
unresting pursuit of earthly pleasure. Do 
they not pour in upon the soul until it is cov- 
ered with the waves, almost overwhelming 
it; then it is, it must cry out to Jesus Christ 
"Lord, save us, we perish," and with the 
same power and majesty as upon the sea with 
His disciples He will rise and command the 
winds and the waves and there will be a great 
calm, and the soul will be freed from its 
danger. 

To whom shall we go but to Jesus Christ? 
What shall separate us from the love of Jesus 
Christ? Not life nor death nor the world. 
If any man love not Our Lord Jesus Christ 
let him be anathema. And what is the prac- 
tical work before you? Live as the friends of 
God, as the followers of Jesus Christ, that you 
may be blameless and sincere children of God 
without reproof in the midst of a crooked and 
perverse generation, among whom you shine 
as lights in the world. 

You have often heard what the Protestant 



72 Clirlst the 3Ian God Our Redeemer. 

and Modern World does not believe. Does it 
not behoove you to hear and to put into 
practice, what as a true Catholic, you really 
believe. Christ, Our Lord, for you, is not a 
mere historic figure surrounded with a certain 
grandeur of doubt and obscurity. He is the 
living personal God, your Saviour, your 
Master, your Friend, One who has loved with 
a love exceeding great, so far as to die for the 
pardon of your sins, that you might live. 
Between your soul and Him, there should be 
not only humble adoration, but a personal 
friendship, a close union of thought, of aspira- 
tions, with the same interest in view, a union 
of sympathy, confidence, and love, not only 
in prayer, but at all times, and especially in 
in the blessed Sacrament, Jesus Christ should 
be the light of your soul. For Jesus Christ 
was before you in Heaven, came to give the 
example of His life on Earth, lives in the 
blessed Eucharist to be united to your soul, to 
give it strength and fortitude against sin, that 
the life of union begun upon earth, you may 
continue in the glory of eternity. This is 
the picture of Jesus Christ in the human soul, 
one so sublime that if it were not taught by 
Jesus Christ Himself, the mind of man could 
not imagine it. 



Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 73 

Wlio is He that even the winds and the 
waves obey Him? He is Christ, Our Friend, 
Our Master, Our King, the Son of God, and 
He manifests His divine power, not only upon 
the winds and the waves of the sea, but upon 
the yearnings and the restlessness of the 
human heart to turn it to Himself. 

And may this God of peace who brought 
again from the dead, our Lord Jesus Christ in 
the blood of the Everlasting testament, fit you 
in all goodness, that you may do His will. 
Doing this, may you do what is pleasing in 
His sight, through Jesus Christ, to Whom be 
all glory forever and ever. 



V. CHRIST IN THE CHRISTIAN SOUL. 

The great St. Paul, tells us that the victory 
which hath overcome the world is our Faith. 
He does not say that Faith is the means to 
that victory, but that the Faith itself is the 
victory which overcomes the world. We may 
say in like manner that the defeat which is 
the world's victory, is the absence of Faith, 
or faithlessness. It is very easy to be overcome 
by the world. The majority of men are over- 
come, because they follow that which is pleas- 
ing to themselves. They live a life according 
to their inclinations, according to their wishes, 
place themselves under no restraint ; live for 
time ; are without God and the thought of 
eternity; without Faith; and therefore their 
life is a defeat, and a failure, because they 
have not that Faith which gives them the 
victory over the world. Faith is what makes 
the Christian man. 

Have we ever placed before ourselves a pict- 
ure of the ideal Christian ; the man who lives 
by Faith, whose life is a victory over the 
world for Christ and with Him ; whose every 
(74) 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 75 

act reflects the life of Christ, and who in Faith 
deserves the name of Christian? 

We may picture to ourselves several 
different scenes in the life of a Christian man, 
the ideal Christian, but at the same time the 
real and the practical Christian ; because the 
life of every Christian must be an ideal life, 
in its striving to reach that perfection of the 
model placed before every Christian. At the 
same time, in the striving, there is real work 
for every faculty of the human soul. We 
may, then, place before ourselves the idea of 
a Christian, and then ask ourselves how is 
the Christian man formed? How does he 
act? How may he lose that which makes 
him a Christian? How may he preserve 
it, and what is the reward of it all? The 
Christian man, is not merely the intellectual 
man. A man has his immortal soul, his 
intellect, his faculties of will and memory 
— he is not yet a Christian, and yet we 
find men who, with these faculties, will place 
themselves above a Christian. They are 
far from being so in reality, for they are 
without the grace of God. There is a two- 
fold work for the Christian. It is upon this 
basis, the natural man — that the building up 



^6 Christ the 3£an God Our Redeemer , 

of the supernatural is done by grace in the 
soul, and then there is the destiny of the 
Christian man. His destiny in this life, is 
sanctity, holiness ; and his destiny in the life 
to come is blessedness and happiness with 
God. Besides this is the method by which he 
works. It is by patience, and by humility, 
and by labor that he brings out this realiza- 
tion of the Christian man. He has around 
about him the insignia making him a soldier; 
and he has his dignity, that is above wealth, 
above honor, above intellectual distinction ; it 
is the dignity of child of God ; dignity of fol- 
lower of Christ ; dignity of heir to an eternal 
Kingdom. And there is that which is to 
follow it all. We ask ourselves then, first of 
all, how is that Christian man formed? He 
is formed in two ways. The internal way is 
by means of Baptism. No man is a Christian 
without that mark upon his soul of being a 
child of God, purchased by the blood of 
Christ, and the merits of that blood applied 
to him in his Baptism conferred upon him 
through the mercy of God, through the merits 
of Christ. vSo that he is formed first by that 
supernatural character conferred upon him by 
the reception of that Sacrament. Next there 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer 



// 



is the labor and the toil of bringing himself 
to cooperate with that grace, of making him- 
self by the grace of God a Christian man, and 
it is not done except by that earnest, constant, 
persevering effort of his own. Like the tree 
that brings forth fruit, it must be nurtured ; 
it must be watched over and cared for, if it is 
to bring forth fruit in season. Like the 
soldier, he must be drilled and trained, for he 
is not a soldier if only in idleness ; he must be 
equipped for the time of war, to fight and win 
the victory for his King. And so the Chris- 
tian must be formed. Again the Christian is 
formed like a painting or a piece of sculpture; 
like a statue that is chiseled out of the solid 
marble ; then comes the smoothing out of the 
lines ; then the perfecting of the features of 
that statue, which must be conformed to the 
model, Christ our Lord ; then the filling in of 
the color, and the delicacy of taste by which 
that picture resembles the original : and the 
closer and more perfect that picture or statue 
is to that which it represents, the greater the 
value of that statue or picture. And so the 
Christian man, the more his Model, Christ, is 
before him, the better Christian he is. How 
does this Christian man act in his daily life? 

L.«fC. 



78 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

He should have his Model before him. Never 
must it be absent from him ; never away from 
his eyes ; never out of his heart. That Model, 
Christ, is there for every Christian man ; be- 
cause each individual, whatever his station in 
life, whatever his duties, must have before 
him that divine Model. And so in the family, 
the father must be a perfect father to follow 
out the ideal of a Christian : the mother of the 
family, the perfect mother, the perfect wife : 
and the children, in their relations to their 
parents perfect in the fulfilment of their duties, 
perfect brothers, perfect sisters. This is the 
ideal which is placed before every Christian 
soul ; there is no deviation from it. There is 
the high ideal, and the closer and more per- 
fectly that ideal is followed, the more per- 
fectly each one fulfils his duty in life in im- 
itating Christ our Lord. 

We may ask ourselves is this high, noble, 
grand ideal the one placed before every in- 
dividual soul? How can we reach it? How 
presume to strive after such perfection? Does 
God ask it of us all? Pause a moment. If 
we were destined only for a natural life, if our 
work depended upon ourselves alone, if it 
were only for the limits of time and space, we 



Christ the Man God Our Eedeemer, 79 

might say : this is too much to ask of each 
one. Yet, it is the foundation, it is the veiy 
essence of the Christian life to aim at this 
perfection, which is placed before us by the 
life and teachings of Christ, and therefore 
every Christian must direct his life, not accord- 
ing to the teachings of the world, not accord- 
ing to the spirit of the world, but according 
to the teachings of the Gospel, and the Gospel 
is simply the placing before us vividly, the 
life and teachings of God, our Saviour. 
St. Paul says "Unless a man be conformed to 
the teachings of Christ, he shall not enter in- 
to eternity. '^ He shall never enter into the 
portals of Heaven ; and this is the life of a 
Christian ; to bring out in his own life the 
features of the life of Christ. 

Do we reach this height, the sublimity of 
this life of beauty suddenly? No; it is a 
supernatural life ; it is a work of time, of 
patience, of toil, it is a work of self-denial ; it 
is a work of struggles, and a work of trials ; 
but it is a work that must be done by every 
soul that would be true to the name of Chris- 
tian. There are men who call themselves 
Christians, and they leave the cross out of the 
programme of their lives. They do not accept 



8o Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

the teaching of Christ ; they reject His teach- 
ing as they please, and they form to them- 
selves an ideal of their own, which is anything 
but Christ, anything but the teaching of our 
Blessed Lord and Saviour ; and yet they would 
be called Christians! No man can be called 
truly a Christian, unless he accepts the teach- 
of our Ivord and Saviour Jesus Christ, unless 
he accepts all of that teaching, and unless he 
accepts it, not in theory, but reduces it 
to practice. Unless the actions of his daily 
life are conformed to that model and teach- 
ing, he has no right to call himself by 
the name of Christian. It is only such a life 
that can gain the victory over the world. It 
is only the life of faith, the supernatural life, 
which the man lives, not for time, but for 
eternity, not for self or selfishness, but for God, 
when he is holy in mind and body, in his 
thoughts and actions, when he strives to reach 
that ideal which is placed before him in the 
divine life of Christ Himself. That man alone 
has the right to the name of Christian, and 
one who calls himself by that name, and 
deviates from that line in his life, is not living 
in conformity to that life which he says is 
his, but which he does not possess. 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 8i 

Can this liglit or Faith be lost ? Alas ! it 
is true, the gift of Faith can be lost, and 
that gift can be lost through our own fault. 
It can be lost by neglect of prayer, by allow- 
ing the soul to be carried away by the multi- 
plicity of affairs of daily life. They stifle the 
growth of that life ; they do not allow the soul 
time to think, to reflect, to be serious, to look 
beyond the present day, to look out into eter- 
nity, to prepare itself for the future. It can 
be lost — that gift of Faith which alone can 
gain the victory over the world — it can be 
lost by too much presumption; it can be lost 
by ignorance. It can be lost by neglecting 
to look for the light that will be given ; by 
neglect of inspirations and graces; and the 
soul can be overclouded by the darkness of 
infidelity, because it has been unfaithful to 
the gift God has given to it. But, as this gift 
can be lost by neglect, by carelessness, by the 
want of prayer, so this precious gift can be 
preserved, can be made more fervent, can be 
made more ardent and earnest by those very 
means, the absence of which, makes the soul 
lose that precious gift of Faith. And how 
can this light of Faith be increased in the soul? 
By prayer and by humility, and by toil, and 



82 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer, 

by patience. These are the virtues that are 
so hard for the world to recognize, and for 
those who have the spirit of the world, so hard 
to practice. The world does not understand — 
humility. The world does not understand — 
patience. The world does not understand the 
word — evil, except for the immediate gain of 
gold for the present life. So, work for the 
world which is not seen, seems folly to the 
world, but not so to the Christian heart. Hu- 
mility was manifested so beautifully, so tend- 
erly by our L,ord in His Blessed Passion; and 
patience, when He was working not for Him- 
self but for the glory of His Father and for 
you, to give you the precious gift of Faith, to 
give you the gift of divine life — not accord- 
ing to the spirit of the world. It is so easy to 
live according to the spirit of the world ; in 
one way it is easy, and yet, in another way, 
for the soul that loves God, and possesses the 
gift of Faith, it is far easier to live according 
to the teaching of Christ. And how can this 
be done ? By watchfulness, and by flight from 
danger, by the spirit of union with God, by 
the spirit of the presence of God, will the soul 
preserve that precious gift of Faith. 

And what is the reward placed before the 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 83 

soul as the result of such a life — a life of 
faith which overcouieth the world ? The first 
reward is peace; peace of soul; that peace 
which is louged for by the soul that is in sin; 
that peace which is longed for by the soul 
that is in doubt; that peace which is longed 
for by the soul that is in anguish and in pain. 
Faith alone can give that peace which the 
soul is ever yearning to possess. What Faith 
promises, it wall possess perfectly, only when it 
possesses that which is the completion of its 
faith — the possession of God. Peace and 
happiness then, will be the reward of that 
faith in this life. What other reward is offered 
for faith ? A precious death. It is true we 
live in order to die, and if we live well, we 
die well, and if that last moment is a precious 
one, the victory is gained, and all is well, 
and our faith makes that moment precious. 
Another reward above even that, is the 
eternal peace, a peace which knows no 
moment of inquietude, a peace that knows 
no anguish or unrest, a peace that will be 
eternal in the joy, in the perfect joy that it 
gives to the soul in the presence of that God. 
Faith, then, gives to the soul in this life hap- 
piness, here, even in time, and the beginning 



84 Christ the Man God Our Bedeemer. 

of that unending happiness of eternity. What 
else is the reward of that faith? Crosses and 
trials! Strange my 'brethren, strange that 
Faith should bring us as a reward crosses and 
trials, and yet it is so, and were it otherwise, 
we should fail to understand how we could 
follow Christ, follow our blessed Lord and 
Saviour, to be without crosses and trials when 
our King and our Master and our I^eader and 
our Lord is loaded with crosses, with His 
own great cross and with our sins — and we 
should be without them ! Trials of patience, 
trials of peace, trials of every kind, and the 
nearer the soul comes to Christ our L,ord in 
life, the more bitter and the greater will be 
its trials, and this according to the Providence 
of God. And so, dear friends, wonder not 
when you see that those who follow the spirit 
of the world seem to be without crosses. 
When their life is calm, unruffled ; when 
prosperity follows them, when nothing seems 
to be wanting to them, there is one thing 
that is wanting, and that is Faith and the 
Cross of Christ. If you will have Faith you 
will have the cross, you will have the crown. 
There is no victory without a battle. In that 
life of the Christian, before the victory, there 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer, 85 

must be a battle, and there must be wounds 
for the battle to be glorious, and the greater 
the struggle, the more desperate the en- 
counter, the greater the glory of the soldier 
that is victorious. The soul for its reward 
has crosses and trials in this life, for its faith, 
and it is the victory of Faith. The spirit of 
Faith is opposed to the spirit of the world. 
The spirit of Faith is not self-indulgence. 
The spirit of Faith means humility ; the 
spirit of the world means pride and vanity. 
The spirit of Faith means glory of God ; the 
spirit of the world is self-seeking. If, then, 
we are to follow our Leader and our King, we 
are to have crosses and trials as our reward, 
with Him, in this life, and we shall thus be 
like Christ our Lord Himself, and His Blessed 
Mother; we shall be like the Saints of God, 
who met their crosses and their trials and by 
them conquered the spirit of the world, as we 
shall conquer it, overcome it, be victorious, 
because of that very Faith of ours — and the 
reward of it all, my brethren, will come 
surely, and will come abundantly and ,'=^weetly, 
and for all eternity that reward will be ours. 
O ! My brethren the grand idea of a Christian 
Catholic Life — for Catholic and Christian 



86 Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. 

mean the same thing. The Catholic Church 
is the Christian Church founded by Christ in 
the beginning. When we go back in history, 
we go back to the one Church He built, and 
which comes down to our day — and that 
grand idea is placed before every soul to 
accept the teachings of Christ, to accept all 
His teachings, to reject nothing that He 
taught, to live up to the precepts that He has 
given, to model our life on Him, and not to 
depart in the least from the life He has laid 
down for each and all — not to reject but to 
receive all that He has laid down for us. The 
spirit that should be in our hearts at the 
thought of the inheritance we have received 
in our holy Faith, that grand, noble Faith of 
ours that lifts us up above the world if we are 
true to it, that makes us children of God, 
followers of Christ, if we are true to its 
teachings ; because one bearing the name of 
Catholic may place himself far outside of the 
Church according to the vagaries of his own 
will. Our life is but a mockery if we do not 
carry out the teaching of Christ. We have 
that grand idea of following out the teachings 
of our Faith which makes us conquerors, 
warriors of our Lord, working out His glory, 



Christ the Man God Our Redeemer. Sj 

working out in our soul that glory which we 
shall see in the light of eternity, and there 
should be in our hearts, in the hearts of 
all, gratitude to God that He has given us 
the gift of Faith, when we consider what it 
means for our peace, for our happiness, what 
it means for our future ; and that same light 
of Faith opens our eyes to that which is 
beyond, to eternity, where Christ our Lord 
after His Resurrection, after His victory over 
death — where He is in the glory of Heaven, 
waiting to receive us. His faithful followers, 
if, in the spirit of that Faith we are true to 
Him, if we follow His divine life, if we are 
free from the contamination of the world, live 
as Christians, are faithful and loyal to our 
King — that reward will be ours : peace in 
life, peace at the moment of death, and glory 
and peace everlasting in the Kingdom of God 
our Saviour, our Master and our King. 



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